phpGroupWare is open source free collaboration software. It is a flexible structure that can host web applications like contact management, emails, shared calendar, accounting ledger and others. phpGroupWare is a web based messaging, collaboration and enterprise management system. phpGroupWare comes with over 50 applications which can be mixed and matched to suit your needs. All of the free collaborative tools are free to download. It means you can alter them as per your specification in order to use this free collaboration software.
phpGroupWare runs via a powerfully structured Application Programming Interface (API) which helps you to develop and host web applications quickly. The free collaboration software supports multiple database back-ends, access controls, GUIs and numerous languages. Thus, phpGroupWare can be used at a large range from small groups of people to large organizations for web based messaging and as an enterprise management system.
Developers deploying their web applications through phpGroupWare or phpGroupWare API can provide wide range of tools for their users for project management web content and document management and sharing and issues tracking. phpGroupWare is a complete GNU package packed with free collaborative tools.
Other free collaborative tools that are available include Braintrust, Show Document and Crocodoc.
Pre-requisites for phpGroupWare:
- Server: Supported database server and php enabled web server.
- Database: Postgresql and MySql
- Email: IMAP and POP3 email server
phpGroupWare is available in tarball, zip file, debs, RPMs and CSV. Prior to beginning to use this free collaboration software, make sure that you have installed php and it’s working fine in your system. To test PHP place a script called test.php in /usr/local/apache/htdocs directory with <? phpinfo() ?> content. The configuration of phpGroupWare is performed via web browser. For this, you login to customize the configuration of phpGroupWare and use the free collaborative tools.
After installing phpGroupWare, you just create users and manage the configuration. But the real task starts when you start using the free collaboration software to host web applications via the phpGroupWare platform. For this phpGroupWare has a “Manage Application” window where by all the applications are listed along with brief description and installation check box.
Whatever applications you want to install, whether that is free web based messaging or an enterprise management system, you just need to click on the check box under install column. And when you end up with the selection you want, click the submit button.
phpGroupWare is able to host web applications that are fully fledged and really expandable along with user icons and detailed features. phpGroupWare coupled with IMAP and database back-end is capable of meeting your tailored needs for free collaborative tools.
Other free web based messaging tools, including ILoveIM and IMO.IM, are also worth a look.
